LHMP #503 Park 1997 The Rediscovery of the Clitoris

This article takes a deep dive into French medical literature of the late 16th and early 17th century discussing the clitoris and developing mythology about it that would linger for centuries. One key element of this discourse was a reliance on textual material, despite many of the authors being surgeons.

We can see this in Ambroise Paré’s Des monstres et prodigies (On monsters and prodigies) 1573 which includes in a discussion of “hermaphrodites” (i.e., intersex people) a discussion of hypertrophy of the clitoris (although he mislabels it as the labia) that can experience erection when stimulated “so that they can be used to play with other women.” In a later edition of the work, he adds material from Leo Africanus’s Historical Description of Africa (1556 for the French translation) about female healers who were said to engage in sex with their female patients, along with an unrelated note that some people in Africa would practice clitoral excision.

Park notes that this is part of a tradition of assigning female sexual deviance onto “foreign” and especially racialized women. Paré experienced push-back on this inclusion from colleagues who felt it was inappropriate in a work aimed at a vernacular audience available to female readers. But more notable is the way Paré’s text jumps from topic to topic implying, but not establishing, a logical connection. From hermaphrodites, he moves to the topic of enlarged labia (clitoris?), then to female same-sex encounters in north Africa where no anatomical anomaly is involved, then jumping to surgical measures for supposedly anomalous anatomy.

This tying together of otherwise unrelated topics (related only in that they involve female anatomy and sex between women) appears in a number of other French medical works in the same era. For example, Jean Riolan in the 1614 Discours sur les hermaphrodits (Discourse on hermaphrodites) argued that most supposed hermaphrodites were simply women with abnormally large clitorises. Riolan then connected this with the Greek tribades and asserted that such women preferred sex with women to men.

While medieval medical texts sometimes speculated on anatomical features that might predispose men to homosexual acts, these ca. 1600 French texts were the first serious post-classical discussion of a similar topic for women. Once introduced into the discourse, an anatomical basis for f/f sex became a prominent topic and displaced medical interest in m/m sex, but very specifically centered around the clitoris.

The function of the clitoris for female sexual pleasure was known to classical Greek authors, but was muddled by ambiguous and imprecise translations as the literature was transmitted via Arabic and Latin authors. [Note: One assumes that this knowledge was well preserved by sexually active women, even if they didn’t have technical terminology for it.]  The “rediscovery” came through a combination of returning to the original Greek texts and direct anatomical research by anatomists. But the medical discourse was strongly colored by anxieties about female sexuality, sex difference, and gender relations that were specific to the French context. We can see this in how the anecdotal stories presented in the texts may superficially be about anatomy, but are infused with lessons about male superiority and authority. It is this complex of topics that Park will focus on, providing an exploration of the key texts and their relationships.

While medical texts of the 16-17th century did not have the same authoritative status as such texts have today, they are a useful context for seeing how professional and popular views interacted and reinforced each other. Physicians were coming to be viewed as subject matter experts regarding legal questions of sex difference. In this context, there was pressure to assign non-normative female sexual practices to an anatomical cause (as opposed to a psychological or moral cause). Park notes that this urge has continued to shape medical theories about lesbianism into the 20th century.

Although early medical ideas about the nature and function of the clitoris fall generally into the “one-sex” model, as discussed by Laqueur, Park notes that the reality is contradictory and complex. [Note: This is a general issue with treating the one-sex/two-sex models as some sort of strict divide. Pretty much all eras treated sex/gender in both ways, depending on context and purpose.]

The article circles back to a detailed review of the contents of various French works and their relationship to classical texts. I think this is going to be easier to summarize using a bullet-point approach.

Paré (Des monstres et prodigies 1573): see above for topics

• 1556 French translation of Leo Africanus: women in Fez who have sex with women (fricatrices)
• Jacques Daléchamps description of enlarged clitoris

Daléchamps (Chirugie Françoise 1570): discussed sex between women in a chapter on hermaphrodites

• Itself a translation and commentary on Paul of Aegina Surgery (fl. 640)
• Also referencing: Aetius (Greek, early 6th c), Caelius Aurelianus (5th c.)
• And Arabic sources: Avicenna, Albucasis
• Says some think that the tribades of Caelius Aurelianus were “female hermaphrodites who abuse human nature”
• Cites Paul’s discussion of “nymphotomia” (clitoridectomy) in Egypt, due to the common presence of an enlarged organ that “erects like a male penis and indeed they use it to play with other women, as their husbands would do.” [Note: Daléchamps was confused over whether the clitoris or labia were being discussed, as both were sometimes called “nymphe”.]
• However Paul makes no reference to f/f sex, and Caelius Aurelianus, though he describes tribades as women who “practice both kinds of sex and desire women more than men” makes no reference to anatomy. The connection is Daléchamps’ addition.

Jean Liébault (Trois lires apparenant aux infirmitez et maladies des femme 1582)

• Adopts Daléchamps’ connection between clitoral hypertrophy and f/f sex.

Charles Estienne (La dissection des parties du corps humain Latin 1545, French 1546)

• Describes the clitoris as “a little tongue (languette)” but thought it was used in urination.

 Gabriele Falloppia (Italian, Observations anatomicae written 1550, published 1561)

• Generally considered to be the first post-classical anatomist to note the erotic purpose of the clitoris.

Realdo Colombo (Italian, De re anatomica 1559)

• “[the clitoris] is the principal seat of women’s enjoyment in intercourse…so that if you not only rub it with your penis, but even touch it with your little finger, the pleasure causes their seed to flow forth”

Andreas Vesalius (Italian, Observationum anatomicarum Gabrielis Fallopii examen 1564)

• Rejected the idea that all women have a clitoris and claimed it was only found in women hermaphrodites. “It is unreasonable to blame others for incompetence on the basis of some sport of nature you have observed in some woman, and you can hardly ascribe this new and useless part, as if it were an organ, to healthy women.”

The key element in resistance to Falloppia’s conclusion was the idea that the clitoris was a direct analogue to the penis, whereas the traditional “one-sex” anatomical theory held that the female analogue to the penis was the uterus/vagina imagined as an “inside out” penis. Thus, if all women had a penis-analogue in addition to a uterus/vagina, then all women could be viewed as “hermaphrodites” bearing both male and female genitals and the category of hermaphrodite (as an intermediate sex category) disappeared, but only comprised some women with larger clitorises than usual.

The second consequence of this understanding was to undermine the idea of the tribade as a distinct category apart from “normal women” who desired sex with women due to having a (large) clitoris. If all women have a clitoris, and can enjoy sexual pleasure apart from being penetrated, then all women are potential tribades (and potential penetrators).

The earlier confusion between labia and clitoris was quickly sorted out.

Séverin Pineau (De integritate et corruptionis virginum notis 1597)

• The clitoris is “that part with which imprudent and lustful women, aroused by a more than brutal passion, abuse one another with vigorous rubbings [confricationibus], whenc they are called confricatrices.”

Jean Riolan (Anthropographia 1618)

• Described the clitoris as potentially being as large as a goose neck, but from personal observation noted only one “as long and thick as my little finger.”
• Included a list of authorities condemning f/f sex.
• (possibly in a different publication) women with enlarged clitorises “in the lascivious can grow and thicken to the size of a finger, [and they] can abuse it to give themselves pleasure, by having sex [habitant] with each other.”

While the earliest French references associating the clitoris with f/f sex had localized it in northern Africa (Fez, Egypt), early 17th century texts begin to cite cases in France, such as Marie/Marin le Marcis who was accused of female sodomy but claimed to have a hidden penis and, after several invasive examinations, was judged to be a “predominantly male hermaphrodite” thus escaping the death penalty, after which Marin lived as a man. Jacques Duval, the examining physician, later engaged in published arguments with Jean Riolan regarding the correct diagnosis of Marcis. In essence, both considered Marcis a hermaphrodite, but disagreed as to gender classification and therefore what sort of sexual partners were approved. [Note: as in many such cases, Marie/Marin de Marcis was quite likely intersex, possibly with male attributes appearing in early adulthood, as they were later described as having a beard.] The theoretical basis of their disagreement relied on two equally incorrect theories of fetal development that different in whether they allowed for actual “intermediate” forms on a spectrum between male and female, or whether all bodies were clearly male or female but might have misleading anatomical deformations. Duval not only considered true intermediate forms to exist, but considered this variation to be natural and part of the diversity of divine creation, arguing for the validity and acceptance of those who didn’t confirm to the sex binary.

Park notes that Duval’s attitude was hardly typical for his age and that “his position was in some respects idiosyncratic and extreme.” But also notes that Duval’s acceptance of a sexual spectrum didn’t extend to approving individual choice of sexual partners, but rather that such people should have legal and medical professionals determine which sex was prevalent for heterosexual purposes.

[Note: Compare to the hints and implications in the early 16th century entry in the Zimmern Chronicle regarding Greta, who was examined to see if she were a “proper woman” because she openly expressed same-sex desire. Although text doesn’t say it explicitly, the examination would either be to see if she were a man in disguise (unlikely, because these were neighbors who had presumably known her all her life) or more likely to see if she had ambiguous anatomy, suggesting “hermaphrodite” status. This would fit in with the earlier model discussed by the French medical writers, where a noticeable clitoris would be understood as an anomaly, and a driver of same-sex desire, rather than being normal female anatomy.]

Early modern French medical writings noted classical authors’ discussion of clitoridectomy in the case of hypertrophy and there are a few references indicating this was sometimes done, or at least requested. (One citation is in 1560 when a woman rejected a request to have the operation at which her husband sought and received an annulment. But the two other cases cited involved a request from an individual or authority to perform the operation but the surgeon refused.) This discussion was not only in the context of unusual anatomy: Riolan (possibly not seriously) suggested that universal removal of the clitoris could be useful for controlling female sexuality.

The image of the penetrative clitoris became entangled in politics via gender stereotypes and the sexualization of political power in the French court when it was dominated by Catherine de’ Medici acting as regent for Henry III. Henry was seen as weak and effeminate and satirized as a passive homosexual. In contrast, Catherine was satirized as masculine and thus connected with images of phallic women.

Increased medical awareness of the clitoris and its function also affected attitudes towards f/f sex. Female homoeroticism that did not involve penetration was typically not classified as a sex act at all, or at least not as “sodomy,” which attracted legal scrutiny. Stimulation by rubbing (which, as Park notes, is the etymological origin of many words for practitioners of f/f sex, such as tribade, fricatrix, confricatrix, etc.) might involve the clitoris as a locus of pleasure, but didn’t invoke it as a penis-analogue. Outside of the image of clitoral hypertrophy, penetration by a woman required an artificial device. Up through the 16th century, anecdotes that make reference to a dildo for f/f sex generally are associated with gender-crossing, where the extreme social and legal reaction doesn’t really distinguish between the gender and sexual aspects of the transgression. A more general use of dildos is referenced by Brantôme. Brantôme, in fact, illustrates the context in which clitoral penetration became a concern, as his extensive discussion of f/f sex doesn’t mention it. But these various writers on dildo-facilitated f/f sex in the 16th century illustrate the context in which anxiety over clitoral penetration was created.

In a context where there is an existing concern about women committing sodomy (i.e., engaging in penetrative sex) using instruments, a newly recognized potential for women—all women—engaging in penetrative sex using their own “normal” anatomy raised new concerns. One reason for dismissing the importance of f/f sex (by authors such as Brantôme and the emerging genre of pornographic works describing f/f sex) is the fiction that only penetrative sex can provide true pleasure. But if women could provide each other with “true pleasure” then not only are women’s interactions a topic of moral and legal concern, but men might be rendered irrelevant. The existence of the clitoris, therefore, threatened the “natural order” of male supremacy. This ties back to Riolin’s comment on clitoridectomy: it wasn’t only about controlling female sexuality but about maintaining the gender status quo.